“I parked behind you, Savannah. If you unlock the car, I can get the packages and Fiona can change her shoes. I’m sure she’d be more comfortable in her Converse.”
Fiona glanced over her shoulder, shocked that he would be so thoughtful and knew so much about her footwear preferences. He was making it really hard for her to stay mad at him when he did small things like this for her.
“Sure,” Savannah walked out with them and helped transfer the bags over toVincent’struck. Fionadidn’tmiss how his eyes widened after seeing the six bags placed in the back. She had gotten a bit carried away in her shop-therapy to get over Vincent and attract a new man.Considering she’d bought so little with him the day before and she’d told him she hated shopping.
“Call me tomorrow?” Savannah hugged her.
“I will.” The first thing she had done when getting into Savannah’s car that morning was program her number in the phone before turning it back off.
“Maybe then you’ll actually tell me what’s going on?”
“Soon,” she said, though she had no intention of it. Savannah already worried about her enough.
“Liar.” Savannah smiled, calling her out. “But I’ll let it slide,” she said before heading back inside.
Fiona climbed intoVincent’struck, hoping something today finally went right.
Chapter 13
“Your phone was being bugged.”
“Come again?” Fiona stared in openmouthed shock at Squeaker’s announcement.
Squeaker repeated herself but she still had trouble believing her. Someone had been tracking her through her phone. “It’s like those parent apps to track their kids. My mom tried it a few times, but I always disabled it.” Squeaker smiled proudly. “But this one is a little more sophisticated.”
“Can you turn it off and I can get my phone back?” It wasn’t that she was permanently attached to her phone, but all her contacts were stored in there, photos. Some casework. Things she didn’t know how to retrieve if her phone was gone for good.
“It’s turned off, but I would recommend a new phone.”
“But you turned it off. Can they turn it back on remotely?”
“No, but when they put the tracker on it, it enabled them free access to your phone. Phone numbers, locations, even photos.” Squeaker gave her a look that made Fiona feel queasy.
Fiona covered her face in mortification. She knew. Squeaker had seen the photos. That could be the only reason she was looking at her like that. How, she didn’t know. Fiona had deleted them. There should be no trace of them. So how did this woman find them? This day couldn’t get any worse.
“What am I missing?” Vincent, who had been pretty silent up until now, asked.
“Dude, your girl—”
“Squeaker,” Fiona interjected. “Stop.” Fiona was shaking like a leaf. “Is there any way to find out who did this? The photos were usually emailed or texted. Rarely left in the open for me to find. There has to be something you can do,” she pleaded. There had to be some way to end this nightmare.
Squeaker took mercy on her, swinging around in her chair to face her computer. “I’ve been following a trail.” Fiona felt Vincent’s eyes boring into her but she ignored him. If she looked, he would ask questions, questions she couldn’t answer.
“Squeaker, what photos?” he asked, looking at her.
Squeaker stopped typing and looked over her shoulder, first at Fiona, then at Vincent. Fiona tried willing Squeaker with her eyes to stay silent but she should have known her loyalty would be to Vincent and not her.
“Here.” Squeaker pulled up some photos on a third screen. Fiona turned around; shedidn’thave to look to know what they were of. This was why she had been so hard-pressed to keep this away from her family. Being followed was one thing but what this person did was unfathomable.
To invade her privacy in such a way. She closed her eyes when she heard Vincent gasp and then curse. Mortification set back in, making her cry. If she lived to be a hundred, she would always regret that one moment she listened to her best friend.
She felt Vincent come up behind her. Now he knew the full truth. Would he judge her as she was sure her family would?
She had thrown her virginity away all because she couldn’t have Vincent. It wasn’t her proudest moment. It was part of her rebellion before she left for the Congo. The first time she’d had sex. It hadn’t been anything to write home about, probably because she had done it only to prove a point to herself.
That she wasn’t frigid and could please a man. She had gotten drunk at the bar with her friend David, telling him about what Vincent had said, and that’s when he came up with the idea for her to prove him wrong. Knocking back a shot of tequila, she found the first cute guy that looked nothing like Vincent and went back to his place.
Two weeks later, the threats and photos started showing up. Photos of her and the man she met in the bar, whose name she couldn’t remember. Most of that night was hazy to her, just flashes. Pain, sloppy kisses, then blackness. At some point she stumbled out of his apartment, feeling in a fog, and hopped in a cab for home. It had all seemed like a bad dream to be forgotten, until the photos started to arrive.
